Fantasy football and other fantasy leagues have become more popular in the US than the sports themselves in some cases. The large NFL and MLB fantasy leagues often involve large sums of money put up by players to ultimately go to the season winner, thereby shutting out perhaps their largest audience and a whole sector of people who might enjoy the game but aren't old enough to play for money. Lacrosse, as a sport has also been shut out of world of fantasy sports, generally due to the erratic nature of scores and stats reporting from the pro leagues and teams and most smaller Universities playing the college game. But Brine found the solution and created the Brine LAX Fantasy Challenge.

The Brine LAX Fantasy Challenge pits you and everyone else in the game against each other picking college games each week for great Brine prizes with a grand prize winner at the end of the season. There's no investment by the players so it's not even close to gambling (kids can play) and Brine itself is keeping the stats to report winners and even allow players to research the teams each week before making picks which makes lacrosse a viable fantasy game. Even more importantly, it's a snap to play for everyone. You can spend tons of time doing research and making meticulous picks if that's your thing or you can just pop in weekly and make heartstring picks in about 2 minutes.

The contest goes on all season and you can join anytime during the 13 weeks. Points for the grand prize start being accumulated beginning with the first week so someone who joins halfway through may not be able to earn enough points for the grand prize but they still will be able to win weekly prizes. What this means is that you should sign up today and play the whole season. Truth is, in our opinion, the harder picks are in the beginning of the season and just like the first round of the NCAA basketball pools we all play, these games often decide the eventual winner as there is less research to base opinions on.

The rules are pretty easy. One entry per e-mail address. Sign up anytime (DO IT TODAY!) and you will get an email immediately with your ID and password like the one above. We removed our password from the pictures because we don't want to give it out. Then each week, you'll log in and do research right there on the Brine site and make your picks. The winner will be announced weekly as you log in for the next week's picks. Winners will also be notified via e-mail. The E-Lacrosse staff is really playing and we intend to kick some butt. We are unlikely eligible for the prizes because we are sponsored by Brine, BUT, we will still take great pride in administering a thumping to those of you out there weekly. OK, enough trash talk. We'll see what you got in a few weeks!

Click the banner above and sign up now to be ready when the game site goes live on Monday February 17th for the first week of the season. Can you believe the season is soooo close?

OK, so when you are at the Brine site signing up, don't be foolish and ignore the "Check out the Brine site" banner. We had a bunch of fun in there this week and we're not sure all our readers know about the cool stuff located there.

The Brine bulletin board is one of the better ones on the web. They even used the actual BB in recent ads that garnered critical acclaim.

An instructional area shows you how to string a Monster Mesh...

...or stick to the pipe on a save like Billy Daye.

Of course all of the 2003 Brine products are featured on the site, as well, along with Brine College Partnering information, Events Schedule and lots more. Have fun and we'll see you on the fantasy playing field, in our dust.